


Daemon Theory

by TheLibranIniquity



Series: Primeval/His Dark Materials fusion [1]
Category: Primeval
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemon, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-23
Updated: 2010-08-23
Packaged: 2017-11-06 00:30:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/412732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLibranIniquity/pseuds/TheLibranIniquity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In a world where people's souls literally walk around beside them, Ryan still can't figure Stephen out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Daemon Theory

Stephen Hart's daemon is some kind of falcon. That was all Ryan could gather from Google, which honestly only narrowed it down from 'scary looking bird'. In the two months he's been assigned to the anomaly project, Ryan's only seen the bird stretch her wings a handful of times, and just once has he seen her take flight. Most of the time she's perched on Stephen's right – less dominant – shoulder, regarding the world with the same sort of distant concentration as he does. 

“You could try being less obvious, you know.” 

Ryan half-heartedly bats at the wolf lying supine across his lap. “I'm not staring.”

Larne lifts her head and gives Ryan exactly the same look his mum used to give when he was a kid. It's the kind that says, _I'm onto you, Thomas_ and coming from anyone but Larne or his mum he'd want to deck them.

He can't deny the fascination, though. The falcon is one of the most dangerous natural predators that evolution has to offer at the moment, but this one seems content to just sit there on Stephen's shoulder, taking in every little detail of the world as it goes by. He's wondered more than once what that says about Stephen – and what both he and the falcon would be capable of under the right circumstances.

Today, though, is just another day in Professor Cutter's office. Ryan's quickly found that the easiest way to get through his days of assigned scientist-sitting duty is to retreat to the underside of the stairs at the back of Cutter's office, which has the double bonus of avoiding interaction with Cutter's students and their assorted daemons and allowing Larne to stretch out relatively unhindered.

Office hours have just finished and, judging by the way Cutter hassles out a very nervy first-year and her equally skittish rabbit, it's been a rough afternoon. Ryan can't tell for sure, though – he's had half an ear on his mobile phone, in case Claudia phones, and the rest of his attention is firmly on the flightless falcon. Well, on Stephen as well. Ryan's attention flits between the two almost as quickly as his mind does.

“Settle down, will you!” Larne's complaint is only half-hearted. Ryan grins, but doesn't try to offer any argument this time. What he does do is reach out to scratch behind her ears in a way she enjoys but will never openly admit to. He lets his head fall back against the wall, content to just relax.

Stephen comes back into his line of sight – but unusually, his shoulder is bare. It's different enough that Ryan takes notice, and even the slight movement it takes for him to double-check the absence of the falcon is enough for Stephen's peripheral vision to kick in, and he glances over at Ryan, looks him up and down briefly and then it's straight back to whatever he was doing before. Not as if Ryan was never there – more that he's not interesting enough to warrant more than a spare glance.

“Don't take it personally,” Larne mumbles. “The bird's even worse than he is.”

At that Ryan grins, and scratches her head again. “Now who's been staring?”

Larne growls, the sound low, but loud enough to have both Stephen and Cutter look up from their work. Ianea jumps across from Cutter's desk to take a look for herself, whiskers twitching as she balances on the back of the battered armchair that shouldn't really belong in an academic office, but fits nevertheless. She stares at Ryan with unabashed interest, the same way Cutter does when he's faced with something new.

“Everything all right back there, Captain?” Stephen's amusement is faint, but detectable. It's better than him sounding bored.

“Oh yeah.” Ryan smirks. “Just having a bit of a difference of opinion here, that's all.”

Stephen nods and turns back to Cutter, dismissing Ryan without acknowledgement but it doesn't seem rude. Just... him. “Don't forget, you've got that lecture on daemon theory at two.”

Cutter groans. “Can't you give it?”

Stephen chuckles. “Nope,” he replies, sounding almost cheerful now. He really must be in a good mood today. “I'm not the one who wrote all those papers that got the module started in the first place, remember?”

Ryan's pretty sure he knows what they're talking about. Despite Cutter's speciality being evolutionary zoology, he'd taken a bit of a tangent once and begun speculating on what point in human evolution that daemons first began to manifest. Lester assigned some of the resulting publications to the Special Forces detachment as 'required reading material' once it became clear the anomalies had the potential to lead to more recent eras of history, not just the ones with non-sentient species roaming around. Ryan never thought he'd find himself seriously contemplating the kind of daemon a Neanderthal might have had, but then again he never thought he'd find himself – and Larne – ready to stay behind in a Permian wilderness with a bonkers professor and his equally insane cat. Ryan had just once made the mistake of assuming Ianea was a normal tabby – she'd seemed innocent enough right up until he'd had to deck the Professor in order to drag him back to that first anomaly and the seemingly normal tabby had gone feral and attacked Larne, and calling that a surprise was a hell of an understatement.

He suspects Larne never really forgave him for any of what happened in the Permian – she still hasn't warmed to Cutter, or the very real possibility of coming up against more dinosaurs. That and she's never been fond of cats, let alone Scottish wildcats, which they now know Ianea is.

_That makes two of us_. He's still wary of Cutter, but respects the man's knowledge and insights.

“Ach.” Cutter grumbles some more and starts moving around the office with a bit more purpose, batting at Ianea, who's apparently taken it upon herself to help him with whatever it is exactly he's doing now.

Ryan would offer to help as well, but Larne shows no indication of moving any time soon, and her casual laziness is starting to seep over into him. That, and his legs have gone to sleep underneath Larne's weight. Standing up again is going to be a bitch.

From this angle he can just about make out Stephen still smiling at the professor. “Filing cabinet right behind you, second drawer down.” He waits for Cutter to pull out a stack of papers before continuing. “I'll be in the library if you need me.”

On cue, the falcon flutters down from her perch on top of one of the book shelves and takes up her customary place on Stephen's shoulder. As Stephen turns so his back is briefly to Ryan and Larne, the bird cranes her neck around to fix the two of them with an intense stare, one that leaves both of them far more uneasy than Ianea's simple curiosity from just a couple of minutes earlier.

Then she turns back, leaving the atmosphere at the back of the office a million times lighter. Ryan and Larne have just enough time to exchange a look of their own before Stephen grabs his bag and jogs up the stairs to the door of the office, and out of Ryan's line of sight.

As he hears the door shut behind them Ryan realises, with sudden clarity, that he doesn't even know the falcon's name. It bothers him more than he wants to admit, and he wonders what he'll learn the answer to first – the question of whether cavemen have daemons, or what Stephen's seemingly tame, flightless falcon is called.


End file.
